Greening the Brownfields of Thermal Power Plants in Rural Areas, an Example from Romania, Set in the Context of Developments in the Industrialized Country of Germany

Abstract

This paper describes the greening of ash dumps from two thermal power plants located in Romania, in the villages of Mintia and Doicești, two rural areas neighboring middle-sized cities, both with architectural, archaeological and landscape heritage. Currently, the two Romanian villages have different fates in the context of shrinking cities, and solutions from the industrialized country of Germany that are more advanced in closing polluting thermal power plants are examples of this. Thus, the greening of industrial waste is one of the current challenges of the energy shift towards renewable energy. Nature-based solutions such as the proposed use of the biodegradable geo-textile in the greening is one of the current trends. The development of the biodegradable geo-textile was contemporary with the creation of the International Building Exhibition (Internationale Bauaaustellung—IBA) Emscher Park in the ancient industrial coal mining Ruhr area, in Germany; later research, around 10 years ago, explored soil pollution at these two Romanian thermal power plants. A recent research study investigated the conversion of the industrial buildings of the thermal power plant in Doicești, however, these buildings were demolished at the end of last year. Mintia thermal power plant continues to function. This paper explores the current challenges of industrial brownfields, energy shift, ecology, the 21st yearly session of the Conference of the Parties (COP21) in Paris and “Laudato si”, spanning 30 years of history and the legacy of the research over this time.

Using Landfill Sites and Marginal Lands for Socio-Economically Sustainable Biomass Production through Cultivation of Non-Food Energy Crops: An Analysis Focused on South Asia and Europe

“…The cultivation of non-food energy crops on marginal land sites like closed landfills, is an idea aimed at generating revenue from the biomass and biofuels produced from energy crop plantation [28,29,65]. At the same time, this course can contribute to phytoremediation of the land, aesthetic development, and microclimate moderation, in addition to covering some costs of post-closure maintenance and aftercare.…”

“…This is in addition to providing potential ecosystem services like soil phytoremediation, aesthetic enhancements, micro-climate and environment moderation [20]. This strategy is however not restricted to landfill sites but can be equally applied to marginal and degraded lands that are otherwise classified as wastelands [28,29].…”

Adaptation of Post-Industrial Areas as Hydrological Windows to Improve the City’s Microclimate

“…The Rheinelbe Gelsenkirchen forest park is part of the "Industrial Forest Ruhr Area" project, whose origins date back to the International Exhibition Budowlana (IBA) Emscher Park (1989-1999)-then still under the name of the "Residual Area Project". At the time of IBA [31], due to the structural changes in the Ruhr area, there was a great need to develop a concept for the re-use of 10,000 hectares of abandoned industrial land with little availability of financial resources [32]. The urban forest project aims, inter alia, to increase the share of forests in inner-city areas, while enabling natural processes of succession, bioretention and the availability of recreational areas.…”

Adapting Street Profile Design by Using Nature-Based Solutions in New Neighbourhoods and the Retrofit of Buildings

“…That is the case with man-made innovative materials like textile layers used in green covers, supporting vegetation stratification and brownfield recovery, such as the two types of geotextiles, of which some are biodegradable and others are non-biodegradable. The biodegradable geotextiles are good for greening hills [43] and the non-biodegradable geotextiles are good for green walls [44,45], but if nutrients and water are not enough or maintenance is not conducted appropriately, the plants die (as in the case of the Sofitel Hotel in Vienna). This was personally observed in successive visits by the authors, as it will be shown in Section 3.3.…”